


'Twas The Night Before Christmas

by ThatGirlTheyKnow



Series: Annual Christmas Fics [1]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, But I hope it's still cute, Christmas, Fluff, M/M, What am I doing, annual christmas fic, written while tired and sick
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-25
Updated: 2013-12-25
Packaged: 2018-01-06 02:29:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,283
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1101303
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThatGirlTheyKnow/pseuds/ThatGirlTheyKnow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Quick one-shot. Cas is a barista, Dean needs somewhere to temporarily escape his responsibilities. They get snowed in, but it's not nearly as bad as it would seem.</p>
            </blockquote>





	'Twas The Night Before Christmas

**Author's Note:**

> Excuse the title. I have no idea. Excuse the writing- I've been sick. I wouldn't have written this, but it's a tradition for me to write a Christmas fic every year. Merry Christmas everyone.

he cafe is small, but warm, and it’s the best Dean can do at nine pm on Christmas Eve while snowing steadily fell down outside. There’s a boy behind the counter, his age or older, maybe, with bright blue eyes and dark hair who takes his order with a forced smile. When his coffee is done, Dean takes it and sits in the farthest corner from the counter. He sits and drinks and constantly checks his phone for emergency texts from Sam. His phone stays silent, so Dean tries to drift off and relax, for once, give himself a moment of peace as a Christmas present.

-

It works for maybe a couple of hours, until the barista calls out that they’re closing, and Dean walks to the door only to find that, isn’t it just his luck, it won’t open due to the two foot layer of snow outside. He turns to the barista and shrugs helplessly, and the boy only sighs and turns the coffee machine back on.

“From now on, let’s just say everything’s on the house.”

-

The guy’s name is Castiel, he learns when he puts the phone on speaker while calling his own brother, a man named Gabriel, who demanded to know why Castiel couldn’t just brave it. It takes a few minutes to convince Gabriel that the door won’t even open.

When Dean calls Sam, his younger brother quiets his apologies and reassures him that he’ll be fine alone for the night because, “oh my God, Dean, I’m sixteen, it’s fine.”

After that, the two sit in silence except for the occasional whir of the coffee machine.

-

Around eleven thirty, Dean can’t stand the silence any longer.

“So are you being kept from any family stuff?” he asks.

Castiel, who was sitting on a couch towards the front of the cafe, looks up from the novel he had procured and slowly shakes his head.

“No…” he says. “Only two of my siblings are at home tonight. My other siblings will arrive tomorrow.”

“How old are you, anyway? Castiel, right?”

“Yes. I am nineteen. And you are…?”

“Dean.” He pauses. “I’m twenty,” he offers.

Castiel nods, and then looks as though he’s trying to work out where the conversation goes from there. “On the phone, earlier… was that your younger brother? You sounded very concerned.”

Dean sighs. “Yeah, I don’t want to leave him all on his own. He says he can defend himself, but he’s only sixteen.”

Castiel looks at Dean curiously. “What about your parents?”

Dean stiffens. “I have a father… but he’s not around at the moment.” Then he turns his chair so he was facing the wall, and tries in vain to go to sleep.

-

Castiel approaches Dean twenty minutes later.

“I would like to apologise. I was overstepping my boundaries.”

Dean glares at him for about a millisecond before he sees how sincere Castiel’s eyes are. Unable to stay angry, he plasters on a smile. “It’s cool, man. I get it.”

Castiel is silent for a few awkward moments, before he sits down and says, “My father… is not around.”

Dean raises an eyebrow. “My dad’s around… but not when it counts. My whole life, we’ve been living on the road, going from place to place and living in shitty motel rooms.”

“My father left three years ago. It was up to my brother Michael to lead the household. He was twenty-one. His twin brother, Lucifer, became angry, and run away. Gabriel and Anna, they are the youngest. They were twelve and thirteen. It almost ruined my family.”

Castiel looks down. Dean feels guilty. “You don’t have to, you know. Tell me. It’s fine.”

The boy nods. He looks up at Dean with those large, blue eyes. “Did you raise your brother?”

Dean wants to punch him in the face for a moment, but he’s quickly learning at Castiel doesn’t really know how to talk to people, and really, the guy’s completely harmless. He doesn’t say anything. He just nods, and Castiel gets up to make them both hot chocolate.

-

They talk for what seems like hours, but couldn’t have been more than one or two. They talk about their lives, and their families, and books they like, because they’re snowed in and there’s nobody else to talk to.

As they talk, Dean takes in Castiel. He listens to how passionate he could get about things that were important to him- literature, his brothers and sister. Dean noticed how Castiel was honest about everything, how he didn’t lie or gloss over the truth, because it just wasn’t in his nature, unlike Dean, who would use half-truths while telling the other boy about his life. Dean saw how Castiel never faked interest, or seemed bored. He took in everything Dean had to say like it was important.

Castiel makes him feel comfortable, and somehow, Dean finds himself pouring out his heart to this strange boy with no social skills, and not caring in the slightest.

-

“It’s not fair,” Castiel says sleepily at one point around three am while both of them were curled up on sofas in the back room with towels as blankets. “What your dad put you through.”

Dean yawns. “He tries his best,” he says. Castiel is silent.

-

They wake up only a few hours later when the dim light of the morning filters through the back room’s thin curtains. Dean is curled into a tight ball in an attempt to stay warm. He opens his eyes and across the room Castiel is sitting up on a couch with a serious case of sex hair. Dean bites his lip.

“Merry Christmas,” he says gruffly, sleep thickening his voice. Castiel looks at him with a confused look, but soon realisation dawns in his eyes and he smiles.

“Good morning, Dean. Merry Christmas.”

And without anything else to say, the boys sit in a comfortable silence for a few minutes.

-

“I have to go,” Dean says over a coffee eventually when it was almost seven am. He doesn’t want to leave. He doesn’t want to go back to playing big brother/dad and make excuses for dad’s absence. He doesn’t want to stop by a grocery store and pick up the cheapest food available. He doesn’t want to leave Castiel, not just yet, not when he feels more comfortable with him than he has with anyone for years. He doesn’t want to go back to those pressures and leave Castiel Novak behind forever.

“Oh,” Castiel says. “Of course.”

Dean nods and shoves his hands in his pockets. “Thanks,” he manages. “For the drinks. For the couch. The company.”

Castiel stares at him. “It was my pleasure,” he says sincerely. “I am glad you are the one I was snowed in with.”

-

Dean stands in the doorway of the shop with a takeaway coffee in one hand and a day-old pie from Castiel, on the house, please, Dean, I insist. He looks at Castiel, who is standing next to him and looking at his feet.

“Dean,” the younger boy says. “I would like to see you again.”

“Cas,” Dean says, and hands him a small piece of paper he’s been fiddling with in his pocket. “Here’s my number. I won’t be in town very long, maybe a few more weeks, but… but call me, okay? Really.” He places his hand on Cas’s forearm, and squeezes. His hand lingers for a few more moments than necessary. “Please, call me.”

Castiel smiles at him. His eyes are brighter than they’d been all night or morning.“Of course, Dean. Merry Christmas.

“Merry Christmas.”

And Dean walks back to the motel, feeling better about Christmas than he ever had.

 -  
  



End file.
